[goatsNdonkey]

True, but the negative is still the primary resource material and the negative will have more tonal range than a print. As an archivist, I always try to obtain negatives and prints.

Obviously, you are correct, though I think we probably agree that a really good, large contact print could be one of the better secondary image sourcess to fall back on when there is no negative -- enough so that when going through prints that might need to be scanned or reproduced, it's worth the attention to notice which ones may be contact prints. Recognizing which ones are in fact the exact dimensions of particular film negative frame sizes, as opposed to later standardized enlargement sizes (3x5 or 4x6 with or without even borders), is a good starting place.

[LaurenOE]

When I hear stories like this, I tend to think the photographer is more petulant than practical.
The negatives are something that captured the time they were in.
As time goes on, they become time capsules of what was done.
Think Vivian Maier.
I say put them in a box, let them sit in some cellar somewhere, or closet, for someone to find one day.
You never know.
Imagine if we had all the "throw aways" from when photography was just beginning.
If someone throws away their work, it was probably trash before they did anyway.

[gaweidert]

That is what he gets for using a mainly amateur and movie format film (35mm) for recording his images. If he had used medium or large format film cameras his old images would still be at least as good as any that APSc or "full frame" digital cameras can deliver today. Even pixel with pixel shift.

Pros, shooting in the wild, used 35mm film systems for their convenience. You could carry more gear with you. Not because they delivered the best possible images, For their customers, it was good enough. Even the old pocket folding medium format cameras of 60 or 70 years ago still deliver an amazing level of detail. An average lens on a medium format camera will always deliver more detail than a great lens on a 35mm format camera. I know that this is true for film.

[RGlasel]

I'm definitely a member of the group that likes to archive their own lives, but I can understand why some people would rather "clean house" and throw out old records.

On these shelves and in the three drawers is the RGlasel and Family archive of film photography going back to 1960 and ending in 2011. (My first slides are from 1980, the earliest prints in the albums go back to 1976ish and there are inherited snapshots and professional photographs in the bottom drawer). I don't plan to get rid of any of it, not even the unlabelled negatives in the middle drawer, but that's the kind of person I am. If I selected 20 images of myself to give to my kids, that's probably enough of a heritage to pass on. My Dad has been dead for 25 years, if I kept four or five pictures with him in them, that's enough to preserve his memory for me. My kids were born after he passed away, they have a latent level of curiosity, but realistically a couple pictures of the grandfather they never knew would be enough. As for the hundreds of people in these thousands of images who don't share our genetic material, none of them will have significant meaning to my kids twenty years from now.

When I was on disability for almost all of 2015, I looked at every slide, flipped through every album. In many ways, it was a sobering, almost disturbing experience. What about my best friend from age 6 to 20 that I got an email from out of the blue 10 years ago, but haven't been able to establish real face to face contact with since 1995? What do the pictures of my brothers and sister when they were toddlers have to do with who they are today? It makes me smile when I look at pictures of my wife from 30 years ago, but being reminded of how much our looks have changed since then doesn't affect our relationship today, for good or bad. There is minimal harm in keeping these photographs, but they really aren't relevant to my current life. I can't jump in the DeLorean and alter what happened in the past; if I want to understand why I am who I am today, I have to play the tape of my life in reverse, sequentially reviewing the effects of people and events on my life. I still like being able to look at who I was (actually who I was through the people and places I took pictures of) at an arbitrary point in time, but I'm looking at a ghost.

It's only my life, but I can't accept that the lives of some people are more important than mine, so what applies to my personal situation should apply to society in general. What we see in the past is developed in the context of the present. The only reason to preserve the past is to give us something to frame the present with. Photography is like putting samples of what we see under glass, much like preserving leaves or insects. Photographs don't preserve the living environment that those leaves and insects were a part of before they were collected. Still fun to look at, but not a matter of life or death.

Attached Images

View Picture EXIF

File Date

 

[Helios 1984]

That is what he gets for using a mainly amateur and movie format film (35mm) for recording his images. If he had used medium or large format film cameras his old images would still be at least as good

Do you say that because color films fade overtime, and since 35mm is small the effects are more apparent? (legit question)

[Digitalis]

it appears that Adams sprung, fully formed, as some sort of photographic deity with full perfection of vision and technique when in reality, there were many years of learning and growth.

I know photographers that would sell their internal organs for a "bad" negative from Ansel Adams wastebasket. As for me, I have bad negatives...they actually taught me how to be a better printer in the darkroom.

[Helios 1984]

I know photographers that would sell their internal organs for a "bad" negative from Ansel Adams wastebasket. As for me, I have bad negatives...they actually taught me how to be a better printer in the darkroom.

One can only improve himself by learning from his mistakes, not by deleting them.

[gaweidert]

Do you say that because color films fade overtime, and since 35mm is small the effects are more apparent? (legit question)

No. It has more to do with image quality. A medium format or 4x5 film camera imaging the same area as a 35mm camera will have more silver halide crystals looking at the image. Just like having more pixels looking at the same image. Much better inherent resolution. A lower quality lens on a larger format image can make and image that is technically as good or better than a higher quality lens on a smaller image for this reason. This assumes decent quality lenses. A bad lens is still a bad lens. I have seen this myself when comparing images form my SLRs to images made with my Bronica ETRSi.

One of the things I remember from college where my major was photographic science and instrumentation. The chemistry, optics and physics of photography. Oddly enough no classes in actually taking a good photograph.

[Helios 1984]

No. It has more to do with image quality. A medium format or 4x5 film camera imaging the same area as a 35mm camera will have more silver halide crystals looking at the image. Just like having more pixels looking at the same image. Much better inherent resolution. A lower quality lens on a larger format image can make and image that is technically as good or better than a higher quality lens on a smaller image for this reason. This assumes decent quality lenses. A bad lens is still a bad lens. I have seen this myself when comparing images form my SLRs to images made with my Bronica ETRSi.

One of the things I remember from college where my major was photographic science and instrumentation. The chemistry, optics and physics of photography. Oddly enough no classes in actually taking a good photograph.

That's good to know. I'm relatively new to film, I like my 35mm cameras but I'm quite intrigued by the Meopta, Libitel, Yashica MAT, Rolleicord and such.

[LesDMess]

That is what he gets for using a mainly amateur and movie format film (35mm) for recording his images. If he had used medium or large format film cameras his old images would still be at least as good as any that APSc or "full frame" digital cameras can deliver today. Even pixel with pixel shift.

No. It has more to do with image quality. A medium format or 4x5 film camera imaging the same area as a 35mm camera will have more silver halide crystals looking at the image. Just like having more pixels looking at the same image. Much better inherent resolution.
. . .

One of the things I remember from college where my major was photographic science and instrumentation. The chemistry, optics and physics of photography. Oddly enough no classes in actually taking a good photograph.

In your first response, you are clearly making some assumptions about quality which are simply not true for everyone but may apply to only your own work.

In the second response it is true that a larger surface of film can potentially achieve commensurately more detail. However, many factors beyond the photogs control can influence this so it is up to the photog to determine which is most appropriate.

On third point, simply put a meaningful image captured poorly is better than a perfectly captured image of no consequence.

[RobA_Oz]

I know photographers that would sell their internal organs for a "bad" negative from Ansel Adams wastebasket. As for me, I have bad negatives...they actually taught me how to be a better printer in the darkroom.

I'm sure you know that Adams came very close to losing the lot in a fire. Some of the negatives, including several of his more famous works, were singed along the edge and thenceforth prints made from them were cropped. We back up digital files across several drives and take one to a separate place for safekeeping, but you only get one chance with negatives and slides, as far as archival quality goes.

[Digitalis]

I'm sure you know that Adams came very close to losing the lot in a fire. Some of the negatives, including several of his more famous works, were singed along the edge

Some of Michael Reichmann's early works were lost to a flood, many of his favorite images on film were destroyed completely. This was a bit of a turning point for him as digital photography was beginning to appear in consumer markets.

[gaweidert]

In your first response, you are clearly making some assumptions about quality which are simply not true for everyone but may apply to only your own work.

In the second response it is true that a larger surface of film can potentially achieve commensurately more detail. However, many factors beyond the photogs control can influence this so it is up to the photog to determine which is most appropriate.

On third point, simply put a meaningful image captured poorly is better than a perfectly captured image of no consequence.

First point: In the ancient days of my youth almost all pros were commercial and/or wedding photographers. While they didn't look down on 35mm, it did not deliver the quality that their customers required. A simple look at the resulting enlargements easily showed the difference. Especially once you get past 8 x 10.

The smaller the format the higher the quality of the lens had to be and before computer aided lens design came into being, designing a lens was a heavily labor intensive activity. And very expensive. That is why the great 35mm lenses of those days impress me so much. 35mm cameras were the bailiwick of street and wildlife photographers for obvious reasons . Studio photographers used larger film formats to deliver the quality that their customers demanded.

Since then there have been tremendous leaps forward in both film and optical technology that have blurred the lines quite a bit. To me the K1 is the first DSLR that I have owned (I also have a K5, K5-IIs and a K3) that is as good or better than film. I love it and it is replacing my Spotmatic II as my all time favorite SLR type camera.

I strongly agree with you on points two and three. I was looking at the subject from a purely technical point of view. The camera is a tool and a good craftsperson can get the most out of any tools that you put in their hands. I spent about 45 years of my life evaluating the technical quality of various imaging systems. For me the first thing that stands out when I look at a photograph is the technical and not the aesthetic quality of the image. Once I have done that I then look at the other qualities of the image. That old habit can be a curse and not a blessing.

[LesDMess]

For me the first thing that stands out when I look at a photograph is the technical and not the aesthetic quality of the image. Once I have done that I then look at the other qualities of the image. That old habit can be a curse and not a blessing.

Been a technologist since 1975 so I can understand where you are coming from with regards to exercising the left and right brain.

However, your evaluation of quality as it pertains to film and digital only applies to your results and not to me even from a purely technical perspective.

[gaweidert]

Been a technologist since 1975 so I can understand where you are coming from with regards to exercising the left and right brain.

However, your evaluation of quality as it pertains to film and digital only applies to your results and not to me even from a purely technical perspective.

Actually when i look at an image the first things that stand out to me are things like banding, vignetting, focus etc. The artifacts in an image. That is generic to every image. no matter who took it. Those are the things that strike me first when I look at an image. As the the "artistic quality" or whatever term is used, that is different for each person.

My wife took a bunch of photos at one of our son's weddings. She printed them out on our Kodak photo quality printer and showed them to me. First word out of my mouth were that the photo was terrible. She said "WHAT! It's a beautiful photograph!" And it actually was pretty a darn good shot from the point of composition, facial expressions etc. But then I pointed out the banding in their faces and in other areas of the print. It was not even visible to her until pointed it out. To me it was glaringly obvious. That is what I mean by the technical quality of an image. Not things like composition. lighting etc.